


It'd Be A Loss

by scarletmaskandwings



Series: It’s the Apocalypse, But At Least I Have You [1]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU (Comics), Red Hood: Lost Days, Red Robin (Comics), Under the Red Hood
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Jay and Tim are not siblings, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-12
Updated: 2018-06-12
Packaged: 2019-05-21 07:32:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,132
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14911055
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scarletmaskandwings/pseuds/scarletmaskandwings
Summary: An alien invasion occurred, and the Justice League sent a distress call for all heroes to coordinate and fight back. Only this time, their combined efforts weren’t good enough, and within four days, hundreds of cities world wide were reduced to burned out shells and heroes were scattered across the world with barely any functioning lines of communication. In the middle of this apocalypse, Red Hood and Red Robin are trying to stay alive while wandering through the wreckage of a city. Or rather, Jason is trying to keep Tim alive, since the other bird is currently bleeding out.





	It'd Be A Loss

**Author's Note:**

> This is another one of my bat-universes, only this time with evil aliens. Once again I am gleefully mashing any and all cannons together, so nothing follows any official timeline, but this would take place some years after Bruce “died” and came back, and Jason has been slowly working more and more with the Bats.

“Hey. Hey stay awake here, Timmers. Your caffeine system is leaking.”

The only reply was a pained moan as Tim stumbled again, Jason’s arm around his waist the only thing keeping him vertical as they made their way across the rubble, desperately looking for shelter before dusk turned to night. Well, Jay was desperately looking for shelter, Tim was busy bleeding out.

“Hey! Snap out of it, replacement,” he said, roughly jostling Tim a little, trying to get a verbal response and keep the other man awake.

“F’ck- off- z’mbie-” muttered Tim without any real heat, his voice hoarse and cracked from all that horrific screaming earlier.

“Uh uhh. Gotta keep you awake. I got a monopoly on being the dead former Robin.” Jay finally spotted a burned out looking ‘building’ that at least still had four walls and a roof mostly holding together and steered them towards it. Fucking aliens. Fucking Justice League.

Tim snorted at that. “N’t- dead- too w’rm- for th’t-”

Once they reached the shelter, Jay carefully lowered Tim to the ground by the door with a muttered stay here and be quiet, as if the other man could move by himself. Drawing his gun, he gently tossed one of his last mini recon bugs through the door and watched its progress of scanning the small building through his helmet HUD. Thank God he’d made his own backup network to keep his systems connected. The tiny dragonfly shaped drone showed the place was clear through visual and infrared and cowl vision, so Jay reholstered his weapon and picked Tim up bridal style to carry him the last few yards inside.

He settled Tim on a reasonably clear piece of concrete floor, cape bundled up to act as a pillow, and rapidly set up his small emergency lights in a semicircle so he could actually see what he was doing, and activated the remainder of his security bugs to guard the perimeter. The soft warm light did nothing to make Tim’s face look less deathly pale and revealed exactly how blood-soaked Jay’s jacket was. He pulled his jacket off with a sick feeling in his stomach, but ruthlessly squashed it down and began pragmatically running inventory on their supplies, easily bypassing Tim’s security measures on his pouches. Out of habit, Jay always kept more emergency supplies on his person than strictly necessary, but it was situations like these when that paranoia paid off, when there was no backup to count on. Hell, he _was_ the backup. He removed his dirty, blood covered gloves and sanitized his hands as best as he could, putting on a pair of rubber gloves before opening the medical supplies.

“Hey, bird boy. I’m gonna check that gaping hole in your side, ‘k?”

“F’ne- do your- w’rst-”

“Well, now that’s just rude. I save your ass from being eaten by some fugly aliens, slap some biofoam in you to keep that caffeine syrup you call blood mostly inside you, and then bring you to this nice dry, burned out husk of a measly-ass shelter, and you think I’m gonna do my worst?” he lightly snarked while undoing the bandages around Tim’s chest, and then carefully unzipped and peeled open the armored Kevlar jacket. The armored Kevlar jacket that had a gaping hole in the side. He cut a slit up the undershirt and peeled it back too, trying to ignore the warm sticky blood now coating his gloves. The biofoam had done its work and slowed the bleeding, which was probably the only reason Tim was still alive. He scanned the other man with the medical suite of his helmet’s Cowl Vision and winced at the images. Not as bad as it could be, but the damage was bad, and it’d need actual stitches, not just a tape and pray patch. He set some gauze back over the open wound, to temporarily protect it while he prepped for surgery, before pulling off his helmet and switching on the Cowl Vision in his domino, preferring that to the helmet’s HUD for medical work.

“Hey, so I’m gonna have to turn you into a sewing sampler here in a bit, kid. No pain meds for now, cuz I need to know if you pass out or not.”

“Yay. Will- have a cool- scar- like you-?” mumbled Tim, cracking his eyes open a bit to look up at Jason.

“Cooler. It’ll probably look like a rose.” He rapidly selected a wad of sterile suture thread and needles, along with thin tubing, gauze, and more biofoam. This was gonna be fun. “Here,” he said as he undid his secondary leather belt and pulled it free from his belt loops. “Can’t have you chewing your own tongue off while I fix you.”

Tim looked up at him and let out a huff that might be an attempt at a laugh. “Oh-? Jus’- chew off- oth’r people- tongues-?”

“Yes, that is perfectly acceptable.” He held the belt up to the too pale lips and said in a softer, gentler voice, “Here, little bird. Bite.”

Still blearily maintaining eye contact, Tim opened his mouth and viciously bit down on the smooth leather.

“This is gonna hurt like hell. Feel free to make as much noise as you like. Ain’t no one around to hear ‘cept me.” He sanitized the gloves again and lifted off the gauze before threading a needle, breathing slowly and deeply to center himself. Fuck. Everything. He calmly directed one of the drones to focus its light directly on the torn flesh before carefully digging his fingers into the wound, ignoring Tim’s hoarse screams as he began stitching together blood vessels and muscle.

* * *

 

Thirty painful minutes later, the stitching and repair work were done, and the injury was sparingly layered with additional biofoam for protection and to encourage the shredded muscle fibers to regrow and realign properly. Tim was gasping roughly, his face wet with tears, but he hadn’t passed out which was a plus in Jay’s opinion. Hooray for Bat-brand pain management techniques. Jay carefully removed the folded belt from Tim’s mouth, internally wincing at the teeth marks on it. He tried to remain impassive as he carefully sat Tim upright, supporting him while gently taping more gauze on and wrapping his cracked ribs, trying to ignore the whimpers at the movement.

“There. All bodily fluids back where they belong. Inside your meat suit.”

“Beds’de- manner- ‘s great-” said Tim weakly, but clearly sarcastically. Good. Sarcasm was a good sign.

“People who lost about fifty percent of their blood aren’t allowed to complain about shit,” replied Jay as he slowly lowered him back down and rearranged the cape pillow. “How ya feelin’?”

“Like I have- massive hole- and scream’d- throat raw-” came the raspy answer.

“Lemme see what I can do ‘bout the latter…” Jay skimmed through the map the mini drones had made of the area for him and miracle of miracles there was theoretically a water pipe with running water only about a hundred yards away. “Stay here. Scream if anything tries to eat you again,” he said, still very, very gently. He tucked one of his spare comlinks into Tim’s ear and checked that it connected to his. He grabbed the two collapsible water bottles and the water purifying cylinders, and headed off, a drone flying in front of him for recon.

He was back in a short amount of time that still felt much too long; the only thing that kept him from panicking was Tim’s steady, rasping breathing in his ear. When he returned, he sat next to Tim with both large water bottles nearby. “It’ll be a bit before you can drink these. Status report?”

“‘m cold,” came the quiet reply.

Jay swore under his breath and rummaged for a shock blanket and tucked it around the other man. Stupid. Of course he’d be cold from blood loss. Blood pressure was also waaay lower than it should be. Fuck. Literally. Everything. No chance to do an IV drip in field, the one thing he _didn't_ have packed. But he did have tubing and hollow needles, and his blood type was a match…. Jason quickly started assembling his rough blood transfusion line, and Tim silently watched him for a little bit.

“Why,” he asked so quietly Jay almost couldn’t hear him.

“‘Why’ what?”

“Why’re you- helping?”

“It’d be a loss if you died on me, kid.”

“I’m not a- kid- asshole.”

“Sure you are.”

“No. Drink legal.”

“Huh. Really? Should get you drunk sometime, bet you’re hilarious.”

“Bet you- cry when drunk-”

Jay snorted. “I can neither confirm nor deny that statement. Mainly ‘cause I don’t remember shit when I drink that much.” He pushed up Tim’s sleeve on his good side and swabbed the inside of his elbow in preparation for the transfusion. Just before he was about to insert the needle Jay paused, frowning.

“What?”

“I- I don’t know what…. The Lazarus Pit. Got no idea if there’s any spooky shit floating around in my blood from that. Don’t know what it’d do to you.”

“Jus’ do it. Worry later.”

With a deep breath, Jay pushed the needle in and connected their blood. They were silent for a few minutes, an exhausted, unnatural silence.

“Hey,” said Tim faintly. “Stop it.”

Jay jerked out of his reverie, still frowning slightly. “What?”

“Frowning. Stop it. Not your fault.”

He roughly scrubbed his free hand over his face. “Yeah? Wanna bet someone will make it my fault?”

“Hey.” He flopped his free hand at Jay’s face. “C’mere.”

The frown turned into a confused expression, and Tim rolled his eyes. He flailed a little but managed to get his hand on the back of Jay’s neck and lightly tugged him downward until their faces were only a few inches apart. Jay didn’t resist like he normally would because shit, that was Tim’s arm on his injured side, you idiot, and awkwardly braced himself so he wouldn’t squish Tim.

“Don’t worry.”

“I’m not-”

Tim pulled his head down even closer so Jay could feel his breath on his lips. “Liar,” he said softly. “You- always worry. Should stop- that.”

“You’re the injured one, I should be comforting you,” said Jay hoarsely.

“Yeah? Well, you’re a- mess.” Tim tugged him down the final inch and pressed his lips softly to Jay’s.

He inhaled sharply and froze for a moment, then exhaled raggedly and hesitantly kissed softly back. “I- I don’t-”

“I forgive- you,” he quietly said. “I don’t- care.” He tilted his head up to kiss him again, and after a moment nipped Jay’s lower lip.

He gasped, and Tim took full advantage of his parted lips and slipped his tongue inside. With a faint moan muffled by their entangled mouths, Jason began exploring Tim’s mouth slowly and thoroughly, tasting the metallic tang of blood as he did so. They finally parted for air, and Jay gently rested his forehead on Tim’s and just breathed.

Tim lightly squeezed the back of Jason’s neck. “We’re- gonna be- ok.”

“You don’t know that,” said Jay hoarsely.

Tim shifted his head until he could nip lightly at Jay’s lips again. “You came back- from the dead. I’ve nearly- died but haven’t. We’re lucky.”

“Heh. That’s one word for it.”

“Shush,” ordered Tim, and then tried to nibble along Jay’s jawline. “Think too- loudly.”

With a soft groan, Jay kissed Tim a little harder with an edge of desperation, and Tim responded eagerly, sucking on Jay’s tongue as they kissed deeper and deeper.  Eventually they parted again, both panting for breath, and Jay dropped his head to the ground by Tim’s shoulder, face buried against the other’s neck.

“We should probably stop now,” whispered Jay against the soft skin just above the shirt collar. “Don’t want you passing out on me.”

Tim chuckled softly and kissed Jay’s head. “Oh, I won’t be the- one to pass out.”

Jay snorted in reply, not deigning to answer. After a few minutes of just laying together, Jay lifted his head to look Tim in the eyes. “Your comment earlier. About chewing other people’s tongues….”

“Not so subtle- thinking of you. Blame blood loss.”

Jay chuckled and tucked his face back against Tim’s neck. “Didn’t even think you meant me. Never know when someone wants me ‘less they hit me in the face with it.”

“Was that enough- tongue to show- I want you?”

“Yes. It was quite satisfactory.”

“Idiot.”

“Nerd. Now hush and absorb my blood so you don’t look like a ghost.”

“Zombie and ghost. Great couple.”

“Heh. Yeah we are. A mess, but a hot mess.”

They settled together in silence, Jay checking the transfusion amount periodically. They were totally screwed right now. But maybe, just maybe they’d survive this mess together.


End file.
